She's Not There

by P J Parrish

“When’s it going to be over?”

  “When it’s over. You’ll be the first to know.”

  More silence on McCall’s end. “You having a problem with this?” he asked finally.

  Buchanan stared out toward the highway.

  “If you can’t do the job, I’ll find someone who can,” McCall said.

  A semi barreled by, spraying up snow and noise.

  “You hear me?” McCall asked.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Buchanan said. “We’re good. I’m good. I’m good.”

  He hung up.

  As he slipped the cell back in his jeans, it caught on his wallet. He took out the wallet, paused, then opened it and pulled out the small brass key. McCall had couriered to him back in Fort Lauderdale. The key to a locker somewhere, a locker that supposedly held two million dollars in cash.

  He held the key up, and it glittered in the hard sunlight.

  Two million gone. His chance to get Gillian back gone. Maybe his own life gone. What was left?

  He stared hard at the key, thinking about McCall, thinking about why Amelia Tobias was such a threat to him, thinking that if he went back to Nashville now Amelia would be dead within a week.

  I can’t do anything good in my life. I can’t even do anything bad.

  No, you can’t, Bucky.

  He put the key back in his wallet and squinted into the sun, so hard that his eyes began to water. He would find her. He would find Amelia and make sure she didn’t disappear.

  “I’m good,” he said softly. “I’m good.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  If Clay Buchanan was dead, no one seemed to know about it.

  Amelia folded the Sioux City Journal and punched the “Refresh” button for the web page on her iPad. The Internet newsfeed for KTIV out of Sioux City popped up again, with the same headlines that had been there all morning. A couple of robberies, a traffic fatality on I-29, and a tax increase for the people of Woodbury county.

  No dead man on an Iowa beach.

  That meant one of three things. Either the news had not yet reached the papers, in print or online, or they hadn’t found his body. Or Clay Buchanan had gotten up and walked away.

  Amelia picked up a fork and cut her last sausage. As she popped it in her mouth, the door opened and a man in a brown and beige uniform walked in. The state trooper ordered a coffee from the hostess. Then, gloved hand on his holster, he looked around the diner.

  Amelia averted her eyes, chewing her sausage and then taking a drink of her coffee. The trooper looked at her with mild interest, then his gaze returned to the hostess as she handed him a Styrofoam cup. With a jingle of the bell over the door, he was gone.

  Amelia let out a breath.

  No way could he miss her. Or the red Impala sitting out front. If there was any kind of alert out for her, she’d be in handcuffs by now.

  Buchanan had not gone to the police. But of course, he couldn’t, she thought. He was a hired killer. How would he explain what he had done to get himself shot?

  But if she went to the police, how could she explain what she had done? And would they believe her? She was a woman with a head injury who had bolted from a hospital room for no reason at all. She had hocked her wedding ring and hitchhiked across the country to a place she barely remembered. Then she took a shot at a stranger on a beach who had tried to strangle her.

  She wasn’t sure she would believe herself.

  It was moments like this when she most missed Ben. She had always been able to confide in him. He had been her compass. He had been the one who had told her to move away from Iowa.

  Get out of Morning Sun, Mellie, don’t stay in this empty place.

  Then another memory hit her like a hard slap, something he had written in one of his letters years later.

  Don’t stay in an empty marriage, Mellie.

  Her memories of Alex had been slowly re-forming over the last eight days, but some core thing was still missing and she knew what it was. Love. She had stopped loving Alex a long time ago. Or maybe she had never really loved him at all. But then, why had she married him? What had happened to make her give up the dancing she loved and marry a man she didn’t truly love?

  She pushed her plate aside and laid her iPad on the table. She had searched the Internet for herself several times since that first day in the Brunswick Mall, but now she needed to know more about Alex.

  The first search results gave her the same links and images she had seen in the Apple store at the mall. The beautiful home, her in a red dress smiling like a plastic doll for the camera. A photo of her and Alex at a charity event. She found articles about Alex’s law firm and pictures of him with other men in suits, none of whom looked remotely familiar.

  A new face popped up on the screen, and she stared at it.

  Owen McCall, senior partner at McCall and Tobias.

  As she clicked through the images of McCall, some memories filtered back. McCall in her home, at the law offices. And one fuzzy memory of sharing wine with him and Alex in a small café as Italian words floated around them. This man would have been a friend, at least to Alex, but the sight of him left a sourness in her stomach, and she sensed he had been no friend to her.

  Then more new faces—two blonde women; one young, one older. The caption identified them as Joanna McCall and her daughter, Megan. She knew these people, too.

  Her eyes locked on the younger woman, and she stiffened, a memory coming into focus. An argument somewhere, this woman yelling at her, something about Alex.

  Amelia looked to the mother, Joanna.

  The emotions this face brought were softer, warmer. A vivid memory full of noise and color—sitting with Joanna McCall in poolside chairs at a yacht club, drinking martinis and making jokes about the old geezers having man-boobs.

  Joanna was a friend, Amelia knew. But she also sensed there had been some uncomfortable space between them, like something genuine had been missing from the friendship or something had been in the way.

  She was filled with a sudden sadness. Her mother and brother were gone. The Bird couldn’t remember her. Was there anyone left who cared about her?

  Kiss a lover, dance a measure . . .

  She blinked hard. Where had that come from? Who had said that to her?

  Kiss a lover . . .

  Had there been another man in her life?

  This is for you, love, just a little thing to remember me by . . . kiss a lover, dance a measure.

  Who had said that? And why couldn’t she remember who he was? And suddenly, she was so very sure it was “he.”

  Amelia looked out the window, out at the flat white landscape beyond the parking lot. She felt so very alone. She needed to talk to someone.

  Hannah . . .

  Hannah was her friend, maybe her only friend. And Amelia had promised her she would check in.

  Amelia spotted a pay phone on the wall and then looked down into the open duffel on the booth. She had Buchanan’s phone tap receiver, and she doubted there was a second one anywhere. She would take the chance that it was safe to call.

  Amelia went to the counter, asked for five dollars in quarters and dropped them all into the phone. It rang a long time before Hannah answered.

  “Hi Hannah. It’s me, Amelia.”

  “Oh my goodness, where are you? Are you okay?”

  Amelia hesitated. She couldn’t tell Hannah someone had tried to kill her and that she had shot him.

  “I can’t tell you where I am, but yes, I’m okay.”

  “Thank God, I thought he had found you.”

  Amelia stiffened. “Who?”

  “Your husband. He came here the night you left. Someone was watching you, all right. And you were right to leave here.”

  “Are you sure it was my husband?” Amelia asked.

  “He said he was your husband.” />
  “What did he look like?”

  “Dark hair, fancy clothes. He kept calling you Mel.”

  It couldn’t have been Buchanan posing as Alex.

  “And the other guy called him Alex,” Hannah said.

  “What other guy?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t hear his name.”

  “What did he look like?”

  “Older guy, around sixty. Lots of white hair and reddish skin, like he drank too much. Like Ted Kennedy.”

  Owen McCall. Why had he gone to Georgia with Alex?

  “Are you sure you’re okay, hon?” Hannah asked. “Is there anything I can do?”

  “No, Hannah,” Amelia said softly. “There’s nothing you can do. I still can’t remember everything, and I can’t go home until I do.”

  “Promise you’ll stay in touch,” Hannah said.

  “I don’t think I should risk calling again, Hannah. At least not for a while.”

  “Okay. Then you find another way. Maybe a postcard or a letter. And remember, you need to send me a real letter. I don’t do that e-mail stuff.”

  “I have your address. I’ll write you from my next stop.”

  “You take care of yourself, hon,” Hannah said. “Be smart.”

  “I will.”

  Amelia hung up and returned to her booth. It had been good hearing Hannah’s voice, but it had brought her no closer to knowing what she needed to do now or to finding someone who could help her.

  A cell phone chirped from the booth next to hers, and she looked over, watching as a teenager punched at his iPhone while he ate his hamburger. Suddenly he looked up, and his eyes met hers. He was maybe seventeen, with a pale freckled face and a blond buzz cut.

  “Why are you watching me?” he asked.

  “I’m sorry,” Amelia said. “I was wondering what you were doing.”

  “Answering e-mails. I got a situation going here. Why do you care?”

  Amelia held up her iPad. “Can you help me with this? I need to get to my e-mails.”

  He gave her a look like she was crazy. “You don’t know how?”

  She hesitated. “I can’t remember my e-mail address. Do you know if there’s any way I can get it?”

  The kid stared at her. “You like been locked up somewhere for the last ten years or something?”

  Amelia forced a smile. “I was in an accident and lost part of my memory.”

  The kid’s blue eyes warmed in sympathy, and he popped out of his booth and into hers.

  “Sorry I was rude,” he said. “I thought you were just another Aunt Tillie.” When she gave him a blank stare, he smiled and added, “It’s what we call old people who don’t know how to use computers. Can I see your tab?”

  She gave him her iPad. In a split second, he had a new screen up—EmailFinder.com.

  “What’s your name?” he asked.

  “Amelia Tobias.”

  “Where do you live?” he asked.

  “Florida.”

  “There’s a listing in Fort Lauderdale for a female, age thirty-three. That sound like you?”

  “Yes. Can I get my e-mail address from this?”

  “Yeah, you can get a seven-day free trial but they’re asking for your credit card number.”

  “I don’t have one.”

  “Well, we can try to log into Gmail,” he said. “That’s what most people use nowadays. See if you can sign in using your name.”

  When he slid the iPad back to her she looked down at the two blank sign-in fields. The first asked for an e-mail address. She typed “AmeliaTobias” and the curser jumped to the password.

  She stared at the second blank field.

  “I guess you don’t remember your password either,” the kid said.

  She shook her head. “How can I find it?”

  “Not much I can do for you there. Most people use dumb stuff like their birthdays, nicknames, their cat’s name, or where they were born. Like I used to use Mickeyhaha because my name is Mick and I was born in Minnehaha County. Get it? Mickey and Minnie? Ha-ha?”

  Amelia gave him a smile.

  “But ever since I got hacked I just use a bunch of numbers and letters and I change it every week. You don’t want black hats finding wormholes to go phishing for your addy.”

  Amelia nodded. “No, you certainly don’t.”

  The kid picked up his cell phone and rose. “Well, I gotta go, lady.”

  “One last thing,” she said. “Can I get a cell phone without a credit card?”

  He nodded. “Sure, you can buy a prepaid phone with cash. They sell them at the Walmart down by Storm Lake.”

  “Thank you, Mick,” Amelia said.

  “Watch out for the black hats,” he said, and left.

  Amelia looked back at the blank password field on her iPad and then typed in B-R-O-D-Y.

  The password you entered is incorrect. Try Again.

  A-M-E-L-I-A1981

  The password you entered is incorrect. Try Again.

  M-E-L-L-I-E

  T-H-E-B-I-R-D

  B-A-L-L-E-T

  Amelia sat back in the booth. This was impossible. Her password could be anything, anyone, any place. There were millions of possible combinations.

  She drew a breath and looked to the window. The Impala was covered in snow and the sky was a steely gray. She couldn’t stay here forever, not in this diner, and not in Iowa. If Buchanan was alive, he would find her again.

  And he wouldn’t stop until he did. It was what he did. She remembered his book—Nowhere to Hide. And the descriptions of him from her Internet search yesterday—hunter of humans. Relentless. He can find anyone with secrets to hide.

  Did she have secrets? Is that why Alex was looking for her? Is that why Owen McCall had been there at Hannah’s house? Is that why Buchanan had tried to kill her? But what did she know?

  She looked back at the iPad. Everything about her life before the accident might be locked up inside the thin little tablet—her past, her friends, her conversations, and maybe even her secrets.

  Kiss a lover, dance a measure.

  Maybe even the “he” who wanted her to remember him.

  She stared at the blank password box. And at the cursor, blinking, blinking, blinking.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  The walls felt like they were closing in on her. It was this place, she knew. She felt the same crushing claustrophobia she had felt as a child back in Morning Sun, caged in by the cornfields. That is why she had loved going to The Bird’s lake house every August. Standing at the shore, looking out at the moving blur where the blue of the lake met the blue of the sky, she could imagine it was a curtain through which she could slip and escape.

  Amelia let the drape fall and turned away from the window.

  For two days now, she had been locked inside the motel room, paralyzed by fear that Clay Buchanan would find her again. He had followed her to Georgia. He had traced her to Iowa. He had even known she was at Arnolds Park that night.

  Now he knew she was driving the Impala. He had the license plate.

  She was trapped. Nowhere to hide. And no one to go to for help. Yet why did she feel there was someone out there? He was out there somewhere.

  Her iPad was there on the bed where she had left it, but she couldn’t bring herself to pick it up again. She was tired of trying to unlock the password to her e-mail.

  She couldn’t stand it. She had to get out.

  Her sweater coat did nothing to keep out the wind as she walked across the crusty snow to the back of the motel where she had hidden the Impala. As she headed out on US 71, she glimpsed a smear of pale pink low in the western sky and guessed it was maybe four p.m.

  There was a sign saying that Sioux Rapids was only three miles away, so she headed south. She needed hot food. She nee
ded to be around people.

  Sioux Rapids turned out to be a clone of Morning Sun, with old red brick storefronts, many of them vacant, lining a deserted Main Street. The only cars were parked in front of Max & Erma’s Bar. She didn’t linger after she finished her hamburger and a glass of red wine, intending to head down to the Walmart Mick had told her about to buy some warmer clothes and a prepaid cell phone.

  As Amelia steered the Impala back out on US 71 into the dark night, her eyes kept flicking to the rearview mirror to make sure she wasn’t being followed. About three miles out of town, headlights flashed in her rearview mirror. A car was coming up behind her, and as Amelia slowed the Impala, her heart started to race. The car was right on her tail now, but she couldn’t see a house or even a light where she could turn in for help.

  Then, suddenly, the other car accelerated and sped past her. She let out a hard breath of relief as she watched its tail lights grow fainter, then disappear as the car turned off the road.

  She noticed the soft glow of lights ahead and realized the car that had been following her had pulled off into a parking lot. As she neared, she saw what looked like a factory set down in the middle of the dark fallow fields. A sign appeared in her high beams—SIOUX CENTRAL HIGH SCHOOL. And below that, all lit up, THE NUTCRACKER BALLET 7 PM TONIGHT!

  She hit the brakes and stared at the sign. With a look at the dark empty highway ahead, she swung left into the parking lot.

  A sweet-faced old woman with hair the color of a Brillo pad was sitting at a card table in front of the trophy case. She took Amelia’s five dollars and handed her a program. Amelia followed the murmur of voices to the gymnasium. A stage had been erected under a basketball hoop, forming a makeshift proscenium flanked with purple velvet drapes. Amelia sat in one of the folding chairs next to a big ruddy-faced man holding a video camera.

  The front of the program showed a drawing of a ballerina and the words “Magda Purdy’s School of Dance and Aerobics Presents The Nutcracker Ballet Starring Special Guest Star Jennifer Collins from Ballet Des Moines.”

  The gym lights dimmed. There were murmurs and giggles coming from behind the purple velvet.

  The music began. It was a recording, of course, but as the first sweet notes of the overture echoed in the big gym, Amelia felt an expansion in her chest, as if breathing had suddenly become easier. When the drapes parted, little white lights went on all around her, the glow of iPhones held up by moms and dads.